Is Darrell Issa a Muslim Terrorist Sympathizer?

After all, Issa is one of a handful of members of Congress that is of Arab descent: He is Lebanese and claims to be a Christian, but how do we know for sure? We can only take his word for it…. Darrell Issa is the only member of Congress to have visited the turmoil ridden Lebanon. You know, the country that has as its elected government a terrorist organization that has its strings pulled by Iran? And prior to that the Lebanese government was heavily influenced—some say completely controlled—by Syria.

Issa has criticized Israel for the way it has dealt with Hezbollah, the Iranian backed terrorist group. He laments that the Israelis have been too heavy handed with the group. Hey, all they did was cross onto Israeli soil, kidnap and torture an Israeli soldier on patrol, and constantly lob rockets into heavily populated Israeli civilian areas. Nothing much to be concerned about there. Certainly there was no reason for the Israelis to launch the offensive of which Issa was heavily critical of “Israel’s wanton violation of Lebanese territory and its somewhat failed attempt to defeat Hezbollah.”

“You can’t end an idea or a terrorist organization by guns alone,” Issa said. Great. So am I right in assuming that Congressman Issa fully supports negotiating a settlement with the Taliban in Afghanistan? What about Al Qaeda operatives who to our knowledge have not committed any acts of violence, and only want to be left to live in peace? Does that mantra apply to EVERYONE, or just Israel? Or when it comes to the United States military, does Mr. Issa subscribe to the Republican American exceptionalist theory that expressly forbids negotiating with any terrorist affiliated organization?

Israel should negotiate with Hezbollah, an organization whose primary function is to wipe the nation of Israel off of the map and kill as many Jews as possible in the process, but the U.S. can’t negotiate with the likes of Muqtada al Sadr?

And just exactly why is Mr. Issa so supportive of Hezbollah, anyway? Where does this love for their Iranian benefactors come from? Perhaps because being an Arab himself, he sympathizes with the government of his Persian cousins?

Why does Congressman Issa object so vehemently to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives having the necessary authority to stop gun sales to those who directly transport them across the Mexican border for sale to Mexican drug cartels? In a hearing last week, Issa, the Chair of the House Oversight Committee, criticized the ATF for not doing its job in preventing weapons from being smuggled into Mexico during an operation they called “Fast and Furious,” an operation Issa had been briefed on over a year ago, and thus he knew all about it.

But in the same hearing he refused to allow ATF agents testifying before the committee to comment on the fecklessness of U.S. gun laws and the difficulty it creates in preventing assault weapons of all kinds—including AK47 assault rifles and .50 caliber rifles—from being purchased in bulk legally in the United States and smuggled into Mexico. It would seem that since the activities of the criminal institutions across the border are such a source of fear and concern among Republican lawmakers, Mr. Issa would want to do everything he can to help the ATF prevent such transactions from taking place. After all, destroying the Mexican drug cartels is in everybody’s best interests (except, of course, for the Mexican drug dealers), and the most effective way to prevent them from being able to slaughter massive numbers of people on Mexican streets and in U.S. border towns (latest estimates have tallied the body count at over 7,000 this year in Mexico) is by making it illegal to purchase such weapons in bulk in the first place.

The Flag of Hezbollah

It would seem outrageous to think that Issa would want to deliberately make it difficult for the ATF to do their job, until we uncover the extent that Hezbollah and the Mexican drug cartels are working collaboratively. Given his ties to Lebanon, it doesn’t seem so outrageous anymore.

According to the Washington Times, the Iran-backed group Hezbollah “has long been involved in narcotics and human trafficking in South America’s tri-border region of Paraguay, Argentina and Brazil. Increasingly, however, it is relying on Mexican narcotics syndicates that control access to transit routes into the U.S.” From the Washington Times story:

Hezbollah relies on “the same criminal weapons smugglers, document traffickers and transportation experts as the drug cartels,” said Michael Braun, who just retired as assistant administrator and chief of operations at the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

“They work together,” said Mr. Braun. “They rely on the same shadow facilitators. One way or another, they are all connected.

“They’ll leverage those relationships to their benefit, to smuggle contraband and humans into the U.S.; in fact, they already are [smuggling].”

The story goes on to state that Hezbollah has successfully ferried its people into the United States, although they have not (yet) carried out an attack on U.S. soil. So why is Issa hindering the ATF from performing its appointed duties?

Hezbollah is based in Lebanon. Darrell Issa is Lebanese, and is the only member of Congress to have visited Lebanon. He was also very critical of Israel’s treatment of Hezbollah.

In 2006, Issa took a trip to Brazil and met with leaders of the considerably large Lebanese community in Sao Paolo. WikiLeaks obtained sensitive communiqués detailing some of those meetings that Issa conducted separately from his official business on the trip. Most of the information in the cables is pretty benign, but how do we know that Issa didn’t secretly meet with those individuals at other times; perhaps with individuals who have known ties to Hezbollah (which would be most people in the Lebanese government these days)? How can we be sure that he did not exchange sensitive information that could be harmful to the United States, or even Israel?

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For your info and as you seem to be lost as to Mr Issa’s religious affiliation, I would like to inform you that his name indicates it. The name Issa means JESUS in Arabic, so its impossible for him to be a muslim. On the other hand you are mistaken if you think the majority of the Lebanese are pro Hezbollah and Syria so please do not imply this concept in your articles.

Why would the name Issa preclude him from being muslim, there are plenty of muslim Issa’s (Yes Jesus (alayhi salaam) newsflash we must believe in Jesus to be muslim) There are many Yahya’s as well (John the babtist) whom we must also believe in.

Although i agree that most lebanese do not support Hiz-b-Ullah but most lebanese are fiercely pro lebanon, which might be why he is critical of Israel.

Jesus was both Jewish and Muslim. All 3 religions believe in Abraham and Moses. It’s just later guys who followed had different camps. Jews don’t believe Jesus was the messiah; neither Jews nor Christians believe Mohammad was the next messiah.

More people have been killed between these 3 great religions than for any other reason. It’s high time – high holy time – that all 3 religions need to be tolerant of each other.

It’s time that satire like this strikes at the heart of this deep religious and ethnic divide. Israelis don’t have a corner on the truth, neither does anyone else. It should not be an automatic thing for Jews in this country to support Israel, and to be against their enemies. It’s time for Israel to understand that it must live next door to other nations, including a Palestinian nation. And Arabs and Palestinians need to understand that it was the Christians that slaughtered 6 million Jews in Europe, so Jews could no longer trust Christians. More Jews have been killed by Christians than any other religion. Muslims need to be tolerant of those next door. And most of all, Christians need to re-learn what Jesus stood for, you know, like ‘turn the other cheek’, ‘love thy enemies’, ‘it’s easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter heaven.’

I’m no supporter of Issa. I condemn his ultra-right, neo-fascist politics. BUT the OB Rag should NOT publish this kind of racist horseshit. The OB Rag should NOT tolerate articles that ape our imperialist government’s Orwellian labels of social movements and groups around the world. Until we have a “balanced” way of talking about the use of violence against civilian populations to promote any political agenda (THAT is the correct definition of “terrorism”) then any use of it to brand ONLY those who oppose US foreign policy is just another buy-in for the new fascist movement. The US government is the world’s single LARGEST terrorist organization. Drones, invasions, CIA-engineered coups, just look at the real history.

First of all, these suspects were reported BY THE GUN DEALERS. Why? Because they don’t want guns to fall into the hands of criminals, because they have friends in law enforcement and because it is ILLEGAL. Gun dealers work hard at preventing straw purchasers. As one of the ATF agents testified, the dealer are our best friends, they are the one’s who make our cases.

Straw purchases of one or two guns once in a while may very well slip through – but when someone shows up with cash to buy 5 AK47’s it’s obvious. You can’t buy in ‘bulk” without the dealer calling ATF – which is EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED IN THIS CASE.

The gun dealers expected the ATF show up and arrest the smugglers – because this is what they had always done. They dealers even had a name for their efforts to get these criminals arrested: Stall and Call.

So what went wrong? Simple – ATF execs ordered the gun dealers to make sale after sale, assuring them that they were, on top of the situation. It was not only line ATF agents who were concerned about all these guns going to criminal organizations. The dealers questioned the policy again and again. One refused to continue until he had orders in writing from a US Attorney. Another wrote the head of the ATF’s Phoenix office saying, “I have many friends in the Boarder Patrol and I am concerned that one of them is going to be killed with one of the guns I am being ordered to sell.” Of course, this is exactly what happened.

The only reason that guns were smuggled to Mexico “in bulk” was that ATF execs ORDERED IT!

In addition, the stats of 90% (early 2009) or 70% (last week) of Mexican crime guns is intentionally deceptive. The average age of these guns is 14 years. The figure includes any gun that passed through the US – INCLUDING THOSE SOLD TO FOREIGN MILITARIZES. This is where the vast majority of US guns come from. Many are from Central America and were sold by the US in the 1980’s. Others were sold to the Mexican military – over 150,000 Mexican soldiers have deserted in recent years – most with their weapons. State department cables released by Wikileaks indicate that the administration knows full well that most weapons are not coming from US gun stores. Those of us who know gun laws also know that many of the weapons being used by cartels are not even legal for sale in the US civilian market.

We need to find out why ATF pumped guns into Mexico for two years – but one obvious motive would be to increase their own budget and justify more gun laws that they would have to enforce.

The only insightful, reasonable and knowledgeable person on this whole page is Vince Wared. He’s 100% Spot on.

The OB Rag should be ashamed of themselves and this piece of complete and in factual drivel that only tries to hinder and impede on the investigation. By trying to smear Issa, they have no respect for the Terry family and the death of their son Agent Brian Terry, hundreds of innocent Mexicans of those responsible for this atrocious crime of LETTING guns walk by the ATF, DOJ and AG Eric Holder.

One wonders if obrag.org swallowed the same misinformation stories about Issa that were pushed by DOJ and Media Matters. How could Issa be briefed by ATF/DOJ over a year ago if no one in either agency knew about the program? And dredging up Issa’s past — yes, convicted of a misdemeanor regarding the unregistered gun — where charges were dropped (car thefts) or never brought (factory fire) is a tactic used by Media Matters.

The whole ATF scandal makes Watergate and Iran-Contra pale in comparison. Federal agents responsible for enforcing weapons laws LET guns flow to Mexico for almost TWO YEARS. DOJ/ATF has not produced a single indictment, criminal charge, arrest or even a damn document that discusses any of these against a single ranking cartel member. If catching Cartel members was the plan, it was poorly planned and execution was even worse. Those in charge of this operation need to be fired and possibly prosecuted, all the way up to A.G. Holder. If DOJ cannot produce case files that show which cartel members on which they had evidence of gunrunning then the only other plausible explanation is even worse. Conspiracy to violate our constitution, numerous treaties with Mexico, export laws and federal gun laws to push a political agenda. Letting over 150 Mexican nationals dies to make a political point is aborrent. It’s also immoral. And Illegal.

Bill, to say that this current scandal makes Watergate “pale in comparison” makes me think you don’t really understand what happened during Watergate. It ultimately forced a sitting president to resign. Do some research on it and don’t so casually dismiss it.

@Frank Gormlie – LOL I lived through Watergate and was very familiar with it. That’s why the comparison. In Watergate, no one died. The Obama administration has the blood of over 150 Mexican nationals on its hands, plus the brother of the Attorney General of Jalisco State in Mexico. The ATF “Fast and Furious” scandal implicates multiple federal agencies, the most obvious being DOJ’s Holder. There is reason to believe Obama knew about and authorized the plan. There is the _potential_ in this scandal to not only force a president to be impeached or resign, but several cabinet level positions too, starting with Holder. At the very least, we’ll need a new A.G., probably a dozen new U.S. Attorneys, a new ATF chief, a few slots in the State Dept will open up and perhaps some high level jobs in DHS. So, I’ll paraphrase your own words back at ya; before you dismiss the “Fast and Furious” scandal, do some research before you casually dismiss it.

Bill C – Okay, so you “lived through Watergate” – does not mean you understood it then or understand it now. I don’t have to go into any new scandal to realize the depth of depravity our country suffered during W’gate – a scandal so heinous we now label all scandals with the “gate”. You say no one died and thus it doesn’t equal to this current mess. Are you someone who is using this current one in attempts to dig a hole for the current president? And you even raise the issue of impeachment? OMG. We couldn’t even impeach Bush who lied, took us to war, killed thousands of Americans – and many more Iraqis.

Perhaps we should do a refresher course on Watergate, what happened and why. You could be our first student. (Just a little ribbing, dude.)

Watergate represents so much more than “at least no one died”. My god, man, Watergrate was the wholescale undermining of our democratic form of government, – just for starters.

I’d be happy to lend my copy of “All the President’s Men” to the cause……

It’s sad, though, that the Bush White House was perhaps even more corrupt than Nixon’s, but we were too stupid or too feckless (or both) to do anything about it. It’s the one thing I hate about Democrats: They can be so damned spineless when it comes to what’s important…..

Perhaps if the Republicans would actually allow the President to appoint a head of ATF things might be better? If lack of leadership is to blame in the ATF, then Republicans have no one to blame but themselves since the top post has been vacant for over 2 years, and the guy that Issa is blaming is only the ACTING head of ATF.

But we’re supposed to believe that Republicans actually care about governing and the safety of American citizens? Yeah, right……….

@Andy Cohen – Perhaps if the president would attempt to nominate someone who is both qualified to lead the BATFE and has not made speeches to anti-gun organizations stating his support of their “founding principles”. Of course, I should point out that the “founding principles” of NCBH/HCI/Brady/VPC has alwways been to ban private ownership of handguns and heavily restrict the ownership of long guns. It would be a big start if the head of the ATF was committed to professionalizing the organization, disciplining the management and using proper investigative methods.

And therein lies the problem: Obama wants a guy who is for tighter gun regulation, and that just doesn’t sit well with you and your cronies. Your pal Issa wouldn’t even allow the ATF agents who testified in front of his committee to explain how the pathetic and useless gun laws of this country are hindering their ability to actually do their job! Because that not what you and your Handgun Club want to hear.

Let’s see…….restrictions on how many assault weapons an individual can buy are bad. Dude can walk in and purchase 50 AK-47’s for “personal use”–and it’s all perfectly legal–but you squawk when, as expected, the guy does something unsavory with the guns? What was the ATF supposed to do? The purchase of the 50 rifles was LEGAL! What exactly did you expect him to do with them, make a fine planter for rhododendrons out of them? But you have no problem with the guy buying those guns with no background check and no questions asked. And then when something goes wrong, you blame the law enforcement officials who were handcuffed by the law to begin with?

You people are really a piece of work…….Just curious, Bill: What should we do about people like Jared Lee Loughner? Or Seung Hui-Cho? I’m assuming you don’t have a problem with people like them buying all the guns and ammunition and extended clips they want, huh? Because to people of your ilk, there should be NO restrictions on gun ownership whatsoever. EVERYONE should have a gun so we can all just settle our petty disputes Old West style with a bullet in the head.

Do us all a favor: Move to Texas; secede from the Union; and then you can all go and shoot each other to your heart’s content!

Just so you know… as Vince Warde indicated above, the gun dealers did call the ATF for verification because they’re supposed to do that. The ATF and National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) have a program to train dealers to spot “straw buyers” and it’s working. The failure here was that ATF gave permission to sell the guns. The ATF already knew he was a straw-buyer. Heck, they even had a secure web-cam in at least one store so they could watch the buys go down! And you’re saying gun owners or dealers cause the problems? Uriel Patino was allowed to buy over 230 guns from Nov 2, 2009 to Aug 10, 2010 … the ATF documented each one and did nothing for 18 months. Yup, we sure need more gun laws that ATF can let criminals pass on.

So let me get this straight: Illegal immigration into this country from Mexico is our problem and must be solved on our side of the border; Mexico has no culpability there. But now you Republicans are telling us that guns going INTO MEXICO is our problem as well? If they don’t have to do anything about immigration into the U.S., then why should we do anything about LEGAL gun purchases making their way into Mexico? Shouldn’t that be an issue for Mexican border enforcement?

You can’t have it both ways. Either change the law making it illegal to purchase such assault weapons (or at the very least making illegal to purchase more than one or two at a time), or shut up about it. If you want to solve the problem from our side, then regulate the sales of such weapons.

Oh, so we jump from the gunrunning and gun-laws to immigration? Those are linked? Yes, we have an immigration problem along our borders (plural). Yes, Mexico has an Emmigration problem they don’t seem to be eager to solve. They like our dollars coming in because it greatly helps their economy.

You also assume I’m a Republican. Remember what assume gets you. You also miss the point. Gun dealers *must* call for approval before selling guns in bulk to non-dealers. Legal requirement. They have a term for it – “Stall and call”, so ATF can have the buyer interdicted, identified and questioned. This does cut down on straw-buys and gunrunning. Well, unless the ATF aids and abets the illegal buyer and lets him walk… as they did.

Oh my. Did I push someone’s button? I’ll refer you to read Vince Warde’s commentary above – 6/24 at 11:12 am. I’d just be repeating what he said. The facts documented in the ATF case support what Vince says.

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Obama has been notably silent on the gun control issue (other than voicing a general support of the Second Amendment), probably because he knows it’s a political poison pill, being from the Chicago area, he also probably has some firsthand awareness of the fact that even the nation’s most stringent gun control laws have spectacularly and consistently failed to reduce gun crime.

If you’re waiting for the Obama administration to start pressing the issue, you might as well wait for hell to freeze over.

Mr. Moore, In a sense, you are correct. They won’t push it *publicly*. Obama tried that in March of 2009. Obama, Holder and Clinton all pushed the “90% of the cartel’s guns come from the US” sound bite to bolster support for a new ban on so-called “assault weapons”. Once it was disproven, he’s been quiet about it. Last April, the Washington Post did an article on Steve Croley, Obama’s point man on regulatory affairs. In that article, the author quotes Sarah Brady who was visiting the WH on March 30, with husband Jim. Obama dropped in to the meeting and assured her that gun control “was very much on his agenda” and that he wanted them “to know that we are working on it. We have to go through a few processes, but _under_the_radar_”. Whose radar? The media? Congress? The NRA? The public? What was he working on? ATF’s “fast and furious” was certainly “under the radar” until whistleblowers stepped up.

Ah yes, we could go on ad nauseum about the integrity of recent presidents. Bush lied! What about LBJ and the Gulf of Tonkin? Or Clinton wagging the dog in Bosnia? It goes both ways. Watergate involved the principle of a cover-up of “Nixon’s dirty tricks” and the president trying to claim executive privilege against the Congressional investigation. The ATF “Fast & Furious” involves potential acts-of-war against a foreign nation (Mexico), two treaty or agreement violations, violations of US export laws, violations of US gun laws, putting weapons in the hands of brutally violent Mexican drug cartels, obstruction, likely perjury to Congress, malfesance, conspiracy to violate the above laws, violations of the whistleblower act and probably more illegalities. It is already obvious that the architect of the plan was higher up than acting ATF Director Melson. That would be either Deputy AG David Ogden (2009-10) or AG Holder. Holder and Obama deny knowing anything about the program, yet it strains credibility to believe neither man was at least briefed on the operation. As an investigative plan…it’s so boneheaded and fraught with holes, risks and deficiencies it’s laughable as a plan. As a covert plan to increase recovered US weapons in Mexico to shore up support for new legislation, it might have worked if it remained secret. So which is worse – burglary/wiretapping for political gain or allowing hundreds of foreign nationals to die to make a political point?

Bill, just so we don’t spend the rest of the day on this … When you say “it goes both ways” – do you mean both Dems and Repubs have been involved in scandals and power-mongering? If so, can’t dispute that. But what Nixon did was much, much more worse than “burglary/ wiretapping for political gain”. We haven’t even scratched the surface of what Watergate was all about.

And BTW, Bush killed many more than “hundreds of foreign nationals” with his wars. One estimate was a million Iraqis dead.

Frank. Certainly both parties are guilty of corruption for their own gain. We can endless debate which is worse. So happens I find LBJ contemptable for his role in escalating our involvement in S.E. Asia (for some very personal reasons) and for his role in almost destroying North American Aviation. Kennedy was a serial womanizer who had to be dragged into the civil rights arena. Nixon was contemptable for Watergate and his later attutides towards South America. We can debate who or what is worse… and probably never agree. What we can agree on is that our politicians have more self-interest than national interests.

Here’s what people like Bill Caffrey (of the Handgun Club–see his nifty video on his handgunclub.com website) would like to continue is policies that allow people like this access to any kind of weapon they want:

The guy in the video I posted is an American Al-Qaeda member and is openly and overtly calling for a jihad against America and the random slaughter of Americans. And he makes the point directly that you can buy a gun/assault rifle/pretty much whatever you want without any kind of background check. Sounds like a great idea, no?

Mr. Cohen,
You are so ill informed on the subject of firearms law and how terrorist cells operate that it’s almost pointless to continue the discussion. What Jihad Joe said in that snippet is 100 percent, certifiable rubbish. It is (read carefully here) impossible to legally buy a fully-automatic weapon of any kind in the U.S. without a time-consuming and paperwork intensive process. To wit, you must;
a) fill out ATF Form 4
b) pay the required tax (minimum $200) and include a photograph of yourself.
c) obtain the signature of the local police chief on Form 4
d) Mail the form to BATF for processing and a background check
e) Wait anywhere from 3-7 months to receive your tax-stamped registration form.
f) Now you can obtain the firearm from the dealer.
Fully-automatic and select fire assault weapons cannot be legally sold AT ALL without this procedure. There is no “gun show loophole” for them. So Jihad Joe is wrong from the get-go. So are your assumptions and allegations that I would promote allowing known terrorists to obtain weapons.

Your shrill, ill-informed rhetoric and attempts to wildly exaggerate my stances on complex subjects borders on the offensive. I’ve avoided your attempts to bait me by painting with a broad stereotype brush (e.g. “people of your ilk”) and stick to the known facts. It’s clear you think guns are some kind of evil danger to anyone nearby. In that case, I suggest you avoid them for your own safety. And if you find that a uniformed man with a gun also makes you nervous you might consider some therapy to get over it.

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